Ignorance is Scary

[mystang52]

Another story: Years ago DW was friends with a woman from another country. English not being this friend's native language, she was often unintentionally less-than-subtle.
One time DW mentioned our upcoming vacation plans, to which this friend exclaimed "I can't imagine how you can afford to go on vacation when your cars are so old." Actually, at that time our 2 cars were maybe 4 or 5 years old. But this spoke volumes that she thought that they were "so old" and of course she was judging our lifestyle by the cars we drove.

 

[enginerd]

I remember when we had our house built. The saleswoman said they had run our credit scores, looked at our income and "You can afford more house." Trying to get us to go for a more expensive model - as if the one we'd selected wasn't big enough already.

Amethyst

We had a similar experience. When my new wife and I were shopping for houses at age 25 our realtor was dumbfounded that we were pre-qualified for $800k but only wanted to look at houses that were half of that.

 

[ArkTinkerer]

I'm very much of the delayed gratification camp and watching the actions of a time payment sibling used to make me crazy. Then I started repeating the mantra; "lots of ways to live a life".

...
She continues to work, but also has a pension that she can count on. I don't think of myself as working, but have no pension (or IRA or Roth). I can count on only me to fund my future and aged self.

Her lifestyle is different than mine and not what I choose, but hey - lots of ways to live a life.

There is a lot to be said for this. I sometimes wonder what I missed out on by taking some "less risky" paths in life. I can compare this to folks who repeatedly risked it all on business ventures. We remember the ones who either made it big or failed spectacularly. So many in the middle we never notice.

Other people wander the country (or globe). They never worry about security or health insurance. They are willing to let the chips fall where they may and have no qualms if other people (taxpayers for instance) wind up having to foot the bill for their end days. Its another way of looking at it I guess. The last use to bother me more than it does now. Now I only get a bit steamed at those who wind up in the last category and then complain that they want more. I can accept if they made their choices and got what was the social "contract" at the time but not when they want to rewrite the rules at society's expense -- or at the expense of my retirement!

 

[2B]

We had a similar experience. When my new wife and I were shopping for houses at age 25 our realtor was dumbfounded that we were pre-qualified for $800k but only wanted to look at houses that were half of that.

I've never owned a house I couldn't pay cash for since 1989. That really blows their minds. The upselling goes into high gear then.

 

[Amethyst]

Not really similar . We were 2 middle-aged govvies, one planning to retire in a few years, and mortgage rates were 10.5%. We felt we were taking all the financial risk we dared!

Amethyst

We had a similar experience. When my new wife and I were shopping for houses at age 25 our realtor was dumbfounded that we were pre-qualified for $800k but only wanted to look at houses that were half of that.

 

[jIMOh]

Me, too! Now if I could just get rid of parasitic relatives, I'd be all set.

Dirty Deeds done dirt cheap

My bill won't be as high as you might think

 

[Jay_Gatsby]

The good thing about buying a car with a loan is that you can usually get a better price from the salesperson, who figures to make up some profit from initiating the loan for the bank. I used to negotiate the price, making sure to say several times that I needed a good price to keep the monthly payments low. Then, as soon as the bank sent me their coupon book and intro letter, I sent back the first coupon paying off the loan in its entirety. Of course this only works if you pay off the loan!

-BB

Seems like a win-win for both you and the salesperson. You get a better price (even though you could pay cash), while the salesperson gets a kicker for the financing piece (which more than makes up for the better price). As long as there is no early-payment penalty for the loan, I don't see any downside (except for the credit issue of having to take out a loan). Even if there is an early-payment penalty, there is probably nothing that prevents you from paying off everything except for a nominal remainder (e.g., $100).

 

[jollystomper]

I remember when we had our house built. The saleswoman said they had run our credit scores, looked at our income and "You can afford more house." Trying to get us to go for a more expensive model - as if the one we'd selected wasn't big enough already.

Amethyst

+1

This happened to us all three times we purchased a house. I can understand bringing it up one time, but if they pester you... well, we dropped a realtor for doing that. When he came with the "I'm only trying to look our for your best interests", I replied "no, you have proven to us that you are a bad listener, and people who do you have our best interests at heart also listen to us".

 

[fidler4]

I took my 2009 Dodge Ram in to a dealership to get a recall item fixed. The next week I got the below email from the dealership. Also I paid cash for the truck and I plan on keeping it for many more years:


We see that you recently visited our service department on 1/9/2015. The purpose of this email is to let you know that based on the current equity position in your present vehicle, we believe you can trade your 2009 DODGE RAM 1500 for a newer model vehicle with no money down and keep your current payment of $691.00. Your new payment may be even lower than it is now! To participate in this unique program, please reply to this email to schedule a VIP Appointment with your Vehicle Exchange Coordinator

 

[jIMOh]

There are 3 aspects to financial decision making at a high level

1 is cash flow
2 is balance sheet
3 is how those two things change over time and how each item on the balance sheet is linked to each item on the cash flow

Most people only make decisions based on cash flow (can I afford the payment). I have an ex wife like this, and Al has a neighbor like that too.

Some people do think about their balance sheet, but until they learn to grow their assets they haven't mastered #3, and I would venture to say a lot of what people here teach me are details about all 3, especially #3.

 

[powerplay]

I wonder if there are big truck forums where members make fun of their retired neighbor who drives a 1999 Camry and actually paid a mechanic to replace the fuel pump?

Hey now I drive a 1999 Camry and am retired. Maybe I need to peruse some big truck forums and see if anyone is making fun of me. I don't really have any nearby neighbors with big trucks though most have newer cars/suv's. I do pay a mechanic to do maintenance and repairs on my car. I have an even older "truck", a 1996 Dakota. I really chuckle over the vehicles that are called trucks now. When I was a kid a truck hauled logs and pickups were what many families drove for personal vehicles.

 

[Jay_Gatsby]

Hey now I drive a 1999 Camry and am retired. Maybe I need to peruse some big truck forums and see if anyone is making fun of me. I don't really have any nearby neighbors with big trucks though most have newer cars/suv's. I do pay a mechanic to do maintenance and repairs on my car. I have an even older "truck", a 1996 Dakota. I really chuckle over the vehicles that are called trucks now. When I was a kid a truck hauled logs and pickups were what many families drove for personal vehicles.

An old truck that runs is still a truck that can haul things. One of the reasons many people pay for furniture delivery, landscaping services, etc... is because they don't have a way to haul the materials. If I had a truck, I'd be the one fixing my fences with new crossbeams and posts, planting new trees, leveling spots in the yard, putting in drainage, etc... Unfortunately, I don't have a truck (and perhaps more importantly, the time to do those things).

 

[powerplay]

An old truck that runs is still a truck that can haul things. One of the reasons many people pay for furniture delivery, landscaping services, etc... is because they don't have a way to haul the materials. If I had a truck, I'd be the one fixing my fences with new crossbeams and posts, planting new trees, leveling spots in the yard, putting in drainage, etc... Unfortunately, I don't have a truck (and perhaps more importantly, the time to do those things).

You are so right on that! It is really nice to have a vehicle that I can just load a large item into and go. These days it is largely used for my gardening activities at a couple community gardens and delivering fresh produce we grow to a local food bank.

 

[athena53]

Most of the stories here is why Dave Ramsey does so well. <snip>Unfortunately, most of the rest of the population are still struggling to understand "Debt is Dumb." This is the basic message of his program with an actual way to get out of debt. I have personally sent many people in the kind of situation described in this thread to his Financial Peace classes.

I've read a couple of his books and occasionally listen to his radio show. I've never taken Financial Peace but the last time I had any debt other than a mortgage was in 1976 when newly wed DW showed me her car note. She watched me write a check to pay it off and I said we don't do car loans.

I agree- DR is oversimplified (many of us here deliberately opt for borrowing in order to keep $$$ in investments that return at a higher rate that the lender charges), but a huge % of the population needs his approach. A couple of years ago when pledges were down at our church and many people were saying they were having a hard time financially, I got agreement to have an FPU class and had one other woman who was going to help me teach it. I spent a few hundred $$ having beautiful flyers printed up and having a big sign made for the church lawn.

Two people signed up. We gave up and tried again 6 months later and couldn't get enough people to agree on what night/time worked for them. The class never happened. And the ones who had said they were having a hard time were not the ones who had signed up.

When DS got married, it turned out that DDIL, who worked managing inventory for a Toyota dealer, had bought her SUV with a loan. I'm sure she got a good deal on it and it 's a reasonable-sized SUV- I forget what model. DS called me once and asked about taking a loan from his 401(k) to pay off her car loan (interest rate 2%). I told him to keep the car loan! Fortunately, DDIL is very good with money, and I kind of like the fact that they have DS' beater, bought with cash, for his daily commute, and a more substantial, newish car for carting around my wonderful baby granddaughter!

 

[timo2]

An old truck that runs is still a truck that can haul things. One of the reasons many people pay for furniture delivery, landscaping services, etc... is because they don't have a way to haul the materials. If I had a truck, I'd be the one fixing my fences with new crossbeams and posts, planting new trees, leveling spots in the yard, putting in drainage, etc... Unfortunately, I don't have a truck (and perhaps more importantly, the time to do those things).

A few years ago I purposely let go of my last pickup truck (1979 F150) and also the SUV with the intention that I would have purchases delivered and would not do it myself any longer. I got my use out of those and no longer had the frequency of use that made the upkeep and bad gas mileage and insurance worth it. For smaller items, we bought a Fit that holds a reasonable amount of small stuff.

 

[travelover]

A few years ago I purposely let go of my last pickup truck (1979 F150) and also the SUV with the intention that I would have purchases delivered and would not do it myself any longer. I got my use out of those and no longer had the frequency of use that made the upkeep and bad gas mileage and insurance worth it. For smaller items, we bought a Fit that holds a reasonable amount of small stuff.

I got rid of a pickup truck years ago, too. I have one of those cheap folding Harbor Freight trailers that fold in half and stand in my garage. It does 99% of what I want and if I need something bigger I can rent a truck at Home Depot for 20 bucks an hour or have something delivered.

 

[Walt34]

Most people only make decisions based on cash flow (can I afford the payment). I have an ex wife like this, and Al has a neighbor like that too.

You're probably right - I've seen too much of that to disagree. My ex was that way too. It is the reason we divorced (in fairness to her it was amicable, none of the revenge-seeking behavior seen so often). But I just didn't see any future in living paycheck-to-paycheck for the rest of my life. Otherwise she was very intelligent so the behavior was extremely confounding and frustrating to me.

 

[Andre1969]

Absolutely. They even have kits to make diesels deliberately spew out soot onto less than macho vehicles like Prius and others.

 

[HFWR]

I think hating on the Prius is kind of silly, plus SOME of us old hippies might be armed...

 

[Jack_Pine]

Love that. Will always have a truck.

 

[38Chevy454]

Not trying to derail and go off topic, there is a reason Prius get made fun of - the owners will not step on the gas for fear of causing 0.01 mpg less. I have a friend with one, he calls it "the golf cart" and he has it because it is fairly cheap to drive as commuter. Prius are fine if that is what you want. Big truck is fine if that is what you want. It's a free country and both owners can be happy.

Smug pollution from a Prius is just as bad as the rolling coal from diesel trucks.

 

[Bestwifeever]

Looks like the Prius is winning?

 

[travelover]

I think hating on the Prius is kind of silly, plus SOME of us old hippies might be armed...

Harassing any other driver, regardless of the vehicles involved, is pretty silly and yes you never know who is armed.

 

[Jack_Pine]

Harassing any other driver, regardless of the vehicles involved, is pretty silly and yes you never know who is armed.

That's the truth.

 

[Andre1969]

Not trying to derail and go off topic, there is a reason Prius get made fun of - the owners will not step on the gas for fear of causing 0.01 mpg less.

I think the Prius gets made fun of the most simply because it's the most popular of the hybrids. Personally, I think anything with a semblance of a trip computer can be annoying, because it can encourage the same effect.

I used to have an '88 LeBaron turbo coupe that had a trip computer, and currently have a 2000 Park Avenue Ultra with a trip computer, and I'll admit I've been guilty of trying to hypermile the things, to see how high I can get the mpg readout.

I also have a 2012 Ram Hemi with cylinder deactivation. One of the displays toggles through the odometer, the two trip odometers, the outside temp, and a setting that says "ECO". When it goes into 4-cyl mode, it'll say "ECO ON". I know it sounds counterintuitive, buying something with a Hemi and then trying to hypermile it...but I've tried it.